The new look BALD league enters season 25 with many changes. Gone are the Franchise Players. Gone are the bonuses for mediocrity. Gone are the random attributes for the players in the draft. And sadly, gone are a few owners who have been members of this league for many seasons. However, with season 25 comes a major change, eerily similar to what we experienced in the initial season. We shall be transforming this league into essentially a "Goon League", but one like no other. Gone are the players who not only take penalties for spearing, kneeing, cross-checking and fighting, but suffer close to season-long injuries and watch from the pressbox on the IR. No, these guys are not only good at being nasty, they also are healthy and NOT prone to injuries...well not injuries to themselves. These guys can skate, pass, play defense, and stay healthy. Get ready for boxscores full of PIM's, fights and suspensions.

The players now on your roster of 25 will eventually be phased out over the next few seasons. Six of the new breed of players will be added to the rosters each season and MUST play unless suspended or out with a short-term injury. The salary structure remains the same and the goalies still have a maximum TOI of 250 hrs. None of the other bonuses apply, as I am guessing that the teams will eventually achieve parity and gone will be the Holy Grail dynasty...thankfully.
Player Retirements

Once a player's salary goes above $1.035 million, they have 1 more season to play and then shall retire.
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Once a goalie hits the regular season career total of 250 TOI, they must retire
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All players salaries increase at the end of the season, regardless of how many games they play.

The TOI for goalies seems a little unfair. 250 hours is only three seasons, while the skaters get to enjoy six seasons. Sure, most goalies won't play every minute of every game, but 6 seasons is 492 hours. Maybe meet halfway? 350 for normal goalies, 500 for Franchise?

I tend to agree. Actually the numbers for all skaters changed but the goalie numbers did remain unchanged. I will contact Thom (a.k.a. quinet) and submit the proposal for the numbers you suggested. Thanks for the heads-up.

Have you guys found a replacement owner for my Heavy Metal Super Band team? I'm now officially retired and probably won't be back to take care of it. Since it's paid for, it should be easy to find a new owner! Anyways good luck with it!

I think the TOI issue for goalies is a no-brainer, I completely support changing the maximums as proposed above and hope that even those that have retired players under the current restriction will also approve.

We need to determine what penalties we will assess to teams that play ineligible players (players beyond the retirement threshold). All of the penalties that I can think of are pretty harsh (e.g. forfeit each game played with illegal player, team not eligible for playoffs) so i'm open to suggestions.

Should we consider limiting playoff eligibility to players that have played 24 or more games?

trac - if a player plays exactly 24 games, they wouldn't hit the threshold for a full season (25 games or more counts as a full season), but they could still play in the playoffs. That would mean that all the superstars we're keeping at 6 seasons and benched could still play in the playoffs, which is what I think you're trying to get around. I'm not sure if I'm for or against your rule, but I think you meant 25 games either way, right? That way, someone who is in the playoffs has technically played a "full season".

I'll be honest, I think the approach of limiting players to a certain number of games played just leads to hoarding of players, what they call in the Minor League Dynasty "warehousing". The system we're using is flawed.

If you have a lot of patience and allow your best players never to go above 24 games played for a dozen or so seasons, eventually you will have a core of 100/100/100 players. This just means that patience is rewarded above gameplay and coaching. Benching your best players for 3/4 of the season is not hockey.

The problem of warehousing is worsened if playoff games don't count. All that will mean is that owners will bench their core 100/100/100 players until the playoffs - this is hardly a realistic simulation...

I think a better approach is to force retirement or salary increases based on career Time on Ice (TOI). The stats are there and Admin can run a simple script at the end of the year that says if a player reaches a certain career level of TOI their salary increases. This eliminates warehousing and requires the owners to show more strategy than just dogged patience...